1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image display apparatus for displaying a series of images captured at multiple time points, specifically to an image display apparatus which is suitable for displaying a series of intra-subject images captured by using a capsule endoscope inserted in the subject.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, a swallowable capsule endoscope has been developed in the field of an endoscope. The capsule endoscope having an imaging function and a radio communication function is inserted from a mouth into a body of a subject for an observation, and travels to capture images of the inside of organs such as the stomach, the small intestine, and the large intestine according to their peristalsis until it is naturally excreted.
While the capsule endoscope travels inside the organs, image data captured by the capsule endoscope in the subject body is sequentially transmitted to the outside of the subject by a radio signal to be stored in a memory provided in a receiving device placed outside of the subject, or displayed on a display provided to the receiving device. A doctor, a nurse, or the like can make a diagnosis based on images displayed on a display of an image display apparatus based on the image data stored in the memory, or images displayed on the display provided to the receiving device simultaneously with the data reception by the receiving device (see Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2003-19111).
The receiving device as described above performs an initialization before receiving image data from the capsule endoscope by acquiring patient information which identifies an examined subject from an image display apparatus which displays a group of intra-subject images, deleting patient information acquired at a previous examination, and newly registering the newly acquired patient information. In addition, the receiving device is configured to check whether a subject to whom the receiving device is attached is a target subject or not at a time of attachment before receiving image data from the capsule endoscope.
Patient information registered in the receiving device can identify a subject by including plural types of information (such as patient name, date of birth, date of examination, and ID information) of a subject to whose body interior the capsule endoscope is inserted. In the conventional image display apparatus described above, however, when the patient information of the subject is to be registered in the receiving device, all types of information included in the registered patient information have to be input one by one for each examination. Thus the registration of the patient information in the receiving device is cumbersome.
In view of the above, an object of the present invention is to provide an image display apparatus which can easily search for desired patient information of a subject from a database in which patient information of plural subjects is stored, displays found patient information, and reduce a labor for inputting patient information at a time of registration of the patient information to the receiving device of a group of intra-subject images.